In the era of the advanced internet, messaging has become one of its most important core features.
Anyone can communicate with anyone worldwide, instantly and at no cost, thereby enhancing interactions between individuals and businesses. Messaging applications offer speedy communication between companies and their customers, which plays a vital role in improving the customer experience.
Between individuals, chats have become tools for socialization and improved communication. Of course, some people type messages better than they do face-to-face communication.
Chat has played an essential role in globalization and multiculturalism through easier interactions between people from different backgrounds.
Unfortunately, chatting applications have become the main routes companies use to spy on users for various reasons. Your messages are not as private as you may think.
The issue of messaging privacy has worsened with the recent legislation aiming to increase liabilities for firms providing chat servers. This new EARN IT Act threatens to eliminate private messaging in the US, and secure messaging apps such as Signal may be forced to leave the US market.
The legislation may end messaging privacy as we know it. Typically, tech companies that provide encrypted and private messaging will need to rewrite software to allow authorities special access to users’ messages. EARN IT Act seeks to force companies to create a backdoor on their end to end encryption software used for messages.
According to Electronic Frontier Foundation, the EARN IT Act would be a disaster for internet users’ security and free speech.
Privacy is your right, but the working of technology these days makes it difficult to have private conversations with anyone. However, there is a solution, and it is in the form of decentralized chat.
Introducing DChat
In the world of crypto, payments are the core feature. You can pay any business or individual instantly around the world, and at very low costs. Billions of users use crypto to pay for goods and services daily.
So what is DChat?
DChat is a blend of messaging and crypto, which takes the best of the two worlds.
Before Unstoppable Domains, the idea of a decentralized chat only existed in theory. There is no other chat app that seamlessly integrates with a payment system and your crypto address. In a nutshell, DChat is WhatsApp and PayPal, with the advantage of enhanced privacy and security.
DChat or the Unstoppable Chat, the product of an incentive program, Mozilla’s “Fix the Internet” incubator, is based on the concept of blockchain technology. The chat employs end-to-end encryption and peer-to-peer networks to promote confidentiality. It took three months of development to create dChat.
In contrast to applications such as Facebook messenger, you can encrypt, own and store your messages on your server when using dChat.
The main goal of the dChat developers is to make their company the cornerstone of the decentralized web, similar to the status of Facebook in the centralized web, and the dChat is already moving it in that direction.
Universal Chat
dChat integrates with p2p networks and your cryptocurrency wallet to give you full control over your messages. However, you need a private key from your Ethereum wallet to sign in to dChat and unlock the encrypted chats.
The primary objective of integration with crypto wallet is to provide maximum privacy. DChat allows users to create a separate wallet to enhance their privacy. A centralized dChat server does not exist somewhere, so the government cannot force Unstoppable Domains to divulge the messages’ content.
So far, imToken and MyEtherWallet crypto wallet services currently support dChat before launching their own dChat protocol. Still, any blockchain application or wallet can develop and release features independently, such as stickers apps, games, auto-destruct features, and chat.
DChat is constructed on GunDB, a p2p storage network, to your domain name or blockchain identifier. This makes it possible to attach another protocol such as cabal.chat ID blockchain domain.
Clearly, dChat allows a human-readable identifier to connect the text with payments for anyone to iterate on. It is now easy to send messages to organizations and friends that you interact with, which was not easy in the past because the payment details and domain name are the same.
Using your crypto address, you can keep the same chats, given that you can implement the protocol on any service or wallet. This distinguishes dChat from the other numerous chat applications with features that lock in the user.
DChat gives you a unified inbox, available wherever your crypto address is for clarity and transparency.
Data Safety and Messaging Privacy
The main idea of DChat is secure storage and management of messages and data. Only the users can access chats and delete them if they want.
Messaging privacy has always been an issue as companies snoop for targeted advertisements or blocks the application as part of a government surveillance program. Rather than having a company such as Facebook access your messages, dChat allows you full control over the storage and encryption of messages.
According to Unstoppable Domains, the DChat protocol is quite resilient, especially in resisting intervention. There is no way even for the company to stop you from using the application, which guarantees safety. Getting kicked out of the platform does not deny you access to messages and the account.
All chats are encrypted by default to prevent censorship and spying by companies. Only you, as the user, can read the messages and choose what to do with them. dChat does not need to worry about anti- messaging privacy laws such as the EARN IT Act as new messages go directly to the p2p network from your device.
Well, the only way for the cybercriminal to access the chats would only be to obtain the phone or computer where the private key is stored. dChat is beyond the end-to-end encryption of centralized systems since it does not operate with a database.
Another benefit of the decentralized chat is that it also eliminates text phishing as the individuals or businesses you interact with have the same domain name and payment address.
Furthermore, the text-to-crypto application guarantees continuity in the face of corporate and government regulation. It is the best definition of decentralization of chats, highlighting the original objective of blockchain technology.
DChat remains unaffected even when the company shuts down or gets hacked. You can continue to chat in any other application that supports dChat, which is the best definition of decentralization.
However, on the downside, enhanced privacy may negate anti-terrorism efforts and the capability to stop other illicit internet activities.
Final Thoughts
Apparently, privacy is one thing that is gradually taking a nosedive with such legislations as the EARN IT Act. Governments seek to sensor communication, and centralized chat applications have become their target. It is now not possible to have a private conversation with a loved one or family member.
On the other hand, companies that provide chatting applications snoop on their users’ messages for the primary objective of creating relevant advertisements. What you are discussing in some of the popular messaging apps is no longer private.
Decentralized chat is the future of messaging privacy. dChat is safe, secure, and beyond government control or censorship by any company. If you are continually worried about your messages getting into the wrong hands, it is now time to switch to decentralized chat.
